Jacobiania
much of the information here is taken from the Svalbard page on Wikipedia Jacobiania is located in an archipelago (previously know as Svalbard) in the Arctic Ocean north of mainland Europe, about midway between mainland Norway and the North Pole. It consists of a group of islands ranging from 74° to 81° North, and 10° to 35° East. Spitsbergen is the most heavily populated island, however Edgeøya, Barentsøya, and Prince Charles Foreland, all have significant civilian populations. History Vikings may have discovered Jacobiania as early as the 12th century. Traditional Norse accounts exist of a land known as Svalbarð—literally "cold shores". However, this might also have been Jan Mayen, or a part of eastern Greenland. The Dutchman Willem Barents made the first indisputable discovery of Jacobiania in 1596. The islands served as an international whaling base in the 17th and 18th centuries, when the Greenland whale was extirpated from this region. From 1611 to the 1800s, whaling took place off the western coast of Spitsbergen, by Belgian, British, Danish, Dutch, French, German, Norwegian, Spanish and Swedish ships. They also provided the headquarters for many Arctic exploration expeditions. At the beginning of the 20th century, American, British, Swedish, Russian and Norwegian companies started coal mining. Norway's sovereignty was recognized by the Svalbard Treaty of 1920, with an addition that there would be no military use of Svalbard, and that the other nations retained the rights to their settlements; five years later Norway officially took over the territory. Some historians claim that Norway was given sovereignty as compensation for its Merchant Fleet losses during World War I, when the Norwegian Merchant fleet played an important role supplying the United Kingdom. Only Norwegian and Russian settlements survived World War II. From the late 1940s to the early 1980s, the geology of the Svalbard archipelago was investigated by teams from the University of Cambridge and other universities, led by Cambridge geologist W. Brian Harland. Many of the geographical features of the isles are named after the participants in these expeditions, or were given names by them linked to places in Cambridge. The name of the largest island in the archipelago, Spitsbergen (Dutch for "Jagged mountains") was formerly used to refer to the entire archipelago, while the main island was called West Spitsbergen. 2012 led to a great increase in the population of Svalbard due to the Yellowstone eruption. Thousands of American refugees flooded the island seeing it as one of the safest places in the world, and the 2 year winter brought by Yellowstone would have little effect on the area being that is was already winter year round. After the 2 year winter, Svalbard emerged as on of the most powerful places in the world. Longyearbyen had become a sprawling metropolis, Ny-Ålesund had become the First Domed City and considered a world wonder, and Architects had created Linksevroren, a city entirely built inside a mountain range. In 2014, it was wildly believed in Svalbard that the rest of Norway was holding the people back. the land was strip mined for resources, ignored by the government and Russia had more troops on the island than Norway did. a Rebel group arose called the Liberalengels led by Jacob Hobbs. The group had an approval rating of 90% of the population, and eventually put one of their own in as a locally elected Governor. on June 13th, 2014, the rebels declared the country an independent nation. Norway put up little resistance to this, seeing that their actions would have little or no effect. The people called the country Jacobiania, in honor of the leader of their resistance. Geography and ecology Svalbard consists of a group of islands in the Arctic Ocean ranging from 76° to 81° North and 10° to 35° East, and forms the northernmost part of Norway and the northernmost lands of Europe. The islands cover an area of 61,022 km², of which about 60% (36,502 km²) is covered by glaciation. Three large islands dominate: Spitsbergen (37,673 km² or 14,550 square miles), Nordaustlandet (14,443 km² or 5576 square miles) and Edgeøya (5074 km²or 1959 square miles). There is also the smaller Barentsøya (1,288 km²), Kvitøya (682 km²), Prins Karls Forland (English: Prince Charles Foreland) (615 km²), Kongsøya (191 km²), Bear Island (178 km²), Svenskøya (137 km²), Wilhelmøya (120 km²) and other smaller islands or skerries (621 km²). Svalbard lies far north of the Arctic Circle. In Longyearbyen, the midnight sun lasts from April 20 to August 26, and polar night lasts from October 26 to February 15. From November 12 to the end of January there is civil polar night, a continuous period without any twilight bright enough to permit outdoor activities in the absence of artificial light. In addition to humans, four predominantly terrestrial mammalian species inhabit the archipelago: the Svalbard field mouse Microtus epiroticus, the Arctic fox, the Svalbard reindeer (a distinct sub-species), and polar bears. The Polar bear, found up to the extreme north of Svalbard,13 moreover, the sub-population of ursus maritimus found here is a genetically distinct taxon of Polar Bears associated with the Barents Sea region. Since Polar bears occur commonly on Svalbard and hunt humans on occasion, people need to take precautions when outside the settlements: this includes carrying a rifle. Nevertheless, the law protects Polar bears, forbidding anyone to harm or disturb them unless it is necessary to avert personal injury. A large number of aquatic mammalian species also inhabit the archipelago, including whales, dolphins, seals and walruses. Jacobiania is also a breeding ground for large numbers of seabirds, including Brunnich's and Black Guillemot, Atlantic Puffin, Little Auk, Fulmar and Black-legged Kittiwake. Other seabirds include Arctic Tern, four species of skua, and the elusive Ivory Gull. The Svalbard Ptarmigan, found on the larger islands, is the only land bird present for the entire year. Only two songbirds migrate to Jacobiania to breed: the Snow Bunting and the Wheatear. There is an astonishing variety of flowering plants on Svalbard. Although they are very small, these plants use the short period of 24-hour daylight to produce colourful blossoms. See also: Flowers of Svalbard. Millions of years ago, Svalbard experienced much warmer climates and was forested, even though it was located at around the same latitude as at present. For a phase of several hundred thousand years at the boundary between the Paleocene and Eocene (55 million years ago), Svalbard experienced subtropical temperatures with palms and alligators. Although not generally as warm as this, Svalbard remained mild enough temperatures for forest through most of the Cretaceous and early Tertiary period up until at least 30 million years ago. In February 2008, the University of Oslo announced the discovery of the largest dinosaur-era marine reptile ever found — a pliosaur estimated to be almost 15 m (50 ft) long. Major Citys # Barentsburg (population of ≈475,000) # Hopen (population of ≈800,000) # Longyearbyen (population of ≈9,075,000) # Ny-Ålesund (population of ≈1,050,000) # Pyramiden (population of ≈60,000) # Sveagruva (population of ≈4,070,000) # New Niwot (population of ≈5,200,000) Economy Economic activity centres on coal mining and uranium mining, supplemented by snowmobile manufacturing, and gambling industrys. In the final decades of the 21st century, tourism, research, higher education, and some high-tech enterprises like satellite relay-stations exploded in economic activity The Svalbard Undersea Cable System which started operation in January 2004 provides dual 1440 km fiber optic lines from Jacobiania to Harstad via Andøy, needed for communicating with polar orbiting satellite stations on Jacobiania, some owned by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), both United States government agencies. Exploration for oil and natural gas is underway. Demographics Jacobiania has a population of approximately 50 million people as of 2015. Approximately 55% of the people are American; 35% is Norwegian, and 10% are Russian, Ukrainian and Polish.1 The official language of Svalbard is English, although every citizen speaks Russian, due to mandatory language courses. Education their are exactly 47 universitys in Jacobiania, although the most prestigious is The University Center in Svalbard (UNIS) The University Center in Svalbard (UNIS), established in 1993, was the world’s northernmost higher education institution until 2013, when Ny-Ålesund Tech was founded. Located in Longyearbyen at 78º N, the university offers undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate courses to approximately 500,000 students each year in Arctic sciences. Northern-mosts in Jacobiania Jacobiania contains the northernmost instance of hundreds of institutions - including the world's northernmost school, church, hospital, bank, newspaper, airport with scheduled airline service, movie theater, kebab shop, and in-door swimming pool.